The SuO Sheffield to Carlisle service will still depart Sheffield at 1017, exactly the same as in the current TT, so I'm not sure how you see that as an improvement. And I don't think there'll be hundreds of Nottingham residents queueing up to spend 4 and a half hours travelling to Carlisle on a Sunday!
ER, well. I don't suppose there are hundreds of Sheffield residents doing it on the current 10.17 either, so what do you propose - cut the service back and start from Leeds? I mean, why bother running it at all, if that's your way of thinking. Obviously some people are hard to please.
Fact is, right now, on a Sunday, Nottingham residents can't even get to Sheffield by train to catch the 10.17. (Unless I've missed something.)
From Sunday, 20 May - residents of Nottingham (population, Wiki, appox 0.33m, but I suspect the agglomeration is much bigger), Ilkeston, Afreton, Chesterfield and even Dronfield will not only be able to catch this train, it will take them directly. Not only to Carlisle, but to Barnsley, Leeds, Skipton etc. At a guess, I'd say that 700,000 ? people from the Notts-Derby region offered a direct train service.
If there were a train every two hours like this, you might have a point, but as you must know, there isn't. So in this context, I'd call this a significant improvement to the service. And I congratulate Northern for doing it.
As a small aside, the new service also allows Ilkeston folks who so wish to catch the following EMT Liverpool train ex Nottingham. This obviously wouldn't even be worth a mention in your books, because as clear as day, there won't even be a dozen folks who'd ever do that on a Sunday morning. But some people (like me) believe change tends to take place in increments - and this is another one of those. Very positive, I'd say.
And to get back to the purpose of this thread, Northern have indeed scrapped the 0947 Leeds to Carlisle as well as the 0849, replacing them with just one train at 0919 with a gap of an hour and half between trains instead of the current hourly service at that time in the morning.
This thread went OT into general S&C workings and more almost from the off.
Whaever, to answer your assessment, I'd point out that you are conveniently forgetting there is a new 07.48 Leeds - Carlisle, so they have not done as you imply. You also fail to mention - perhaps you hadn't noticed - that the new 09.19 Class 1 train is now a stopper twixt Skipton and Appleby, so in many ways the OP's original complaint is nullified. (How it can retain its Class 1 status like is a bit of a mystery to me, but there it is. Intriguingly, the new 20.18 Carlisle - Leeds stops at fewer stations, but trundles along as a Class 2.)
Yes, technically there may be an additional service or two, but if they're at times when few people want to travel, that's not really an improvement, is it?
Well, as someone pointed out on another thread - unless you introduce a fantastically imroved clock face timetable - there are always winners and losers with incremental changes. I'd opine that introducing all those stops on the 09.19 is a backward step as it is.
Against this, I see the introduction of the 07.48 Leeds - Carlisle as a great positive, allowing a 'business time' start to the service from Leeds. Then there are later evening trains from both Leeds and Carlisle, giving pax greater flexibility if they are late arriving at these nodes for some reason. You may think otherwise - but since neither of us (I assume) are privy to the data that Northern has on potential passenger demand - it's a matter of opinion. Mine is that these changes are several steps in the right direction, ie offering better connectivity both within and outside all S&C statons. I hope it shows in passenger figures come the first results in December 2019 - because they have largely been falling in recent years.
